"Divers Names and Descriptions are given to it, but all may be reduc'd to this one Definition, That it is that Faculty of the Soul, anointed by our wise Creator to receive, retain and preserve the several Ideas convey'd into it by the Inlets of the Understanding, whether intellectual or sensitive."

"Divers Names and Descriptions are given to it, but all may be reduc'd to this one Definition, That it is that Faculty of the Soul, anointed by our wise Creator to receive, retain and preserve the several Ideas convey'd into it by the Inlets of the Understanding, whether intellectual or sensitive."

Metaphor in Context

St. Austin names Memory the Soul's Belly or Storehouse, or the Receptacle of the Mind, because it is appointed to receive and lay up as in a Treasury, those things that may be for our Benefit and Advantage. Divers Names and Descriptions are given to it, but all may be reduc'd to this one Definition, That it is that Faculty of the Soul, anointed by our wise Creator to receive, retain and preserve the several Ideas convey'd into it by the Inlets of the Understanding, whether intellectual or sensitive.
(ii, p. 16)

Four entries in ESTC: 1697, 1699, 1699?, and 1706.
Text from The Art of Memory. A Treatise useful for all, especially such as are to speak in Publick., 3rd edition, corrected (London: Printed by J. Darby, 1706). <Link to Google Books>